[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----TEXAS, VA., N.C., FLA., ALA., KY.

[Rick Halperin]

Feb. 6


TEXAS----stay of impending execution

U.S. Supreme Court halts Texas execution of convicted killer



The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday put on hold the execution by Texas of 
convicted murderer Lester Bower as it considers whether to hear his full appeal 
including the assertion that his three decades on death row amount to cruel and 
unusual punishment.

Bower, 67, is one of the longest-serving prisoners on death row in Texas. He 
was sentenced to death for murdering 4 men in 1983 in an aircraft hangar near 
Sherman, Texas.

Bower was scheduled to be executed on Feb. 10. He asked for a delay so the 
Supreme Court could consider his appeal, which is pending at the court. The 
next time the nine justices are scheduled to meet to discuss new cases to take 
up is Feb. 20.

Among the legal questions that Bower has raised is whether the U.S. 
Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment has been violated by his 
more than 30-year stay on death row.

According to Bower's court filings, he has faced imminent execution on 6 
different occasions during his time in prison.

Lawyers for Bower have tried for more than 2 decades to have his conviction 
thrown out, saying he was found guilty due to faulty witness testimony. Bower 
has denied ever being at the hangar where the murders took place but 
authorities said aircraft parts found in his home and other evidence implicated 
him in the crimes.

Bower killed Bob Tate to steal an ultralight plane Tate was trying to sell and 
then killed the other 3 men when they unexpectedly showed up at the hangar, the 
Texas Department of Criminal Justice said.

Bower's case raises different issues than a case the Supreme Court agreed to 
hear last month on Oklahoma's execution protocol. The court agreed to block 3 
executions in Oklahoma while it considers whether midazolam, the sedative used 
by Oklahoma as part of its lethal injection procedures, constitutes cruel and 
unusual punishment.

(source: Reuters)

*********************

Supreme Court stays execution of Texas inmate on death row for 30 years



The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday stayed the execution of Lester Bower, who 
has been on death row in Texas for nearly 3 decades.

Bower's execution was set for Feb. 10, but the full court granted a stay 
request until it decides whether to fully consider the case. If the court 
decides not to hear his case, the stay will be lifted; if the justices do hear 
his case, the stay will be in place until they issue a ruling.

Bower's application for a stay request was presented to Justice Antonin Scalia 
and referred to the full court.

In agreeing to halt Bower's execution, at least temporarily, the justices 
raised the possibility that they could consider a 2nd death-penalty case this 
year. The court said last month it would hear a case from Oklahoma focusing on 
the drugs used in lethal injections; last week, the justices stayed 3 upcoming 
executions in Oklahoma until they rule in that case.

Bower was convicted of shooting and killing four men in an aircraft hangar in 
1983. He shot 1 man in an attempt to steal an ultralight plane the man was 
trying to sell, and then shot the other 3 when they arrived unexpectedly, 
according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

His attorneys are arguing, among other things, that executing Bower after more 
than 30 years on death row "constitutes cruel and unusual punishment." Bower's 
execution has been scheduled 6 times during his time on death row; he has come 
within hours of entering the death chamber before the reprieves came, his 
attorneys argue.

Bower, 67, has lived nearly 1/2 of his life with a death sentence. He has spent 
3 times as many years on death row in Texas as the average inmate, according to 
the state's Department of Criminal Justice.

If his execution takes place as scheduled, Bower will have been the 
2nd-longest-serving inmate executed by the state. David Lee Powell, who was 
executed in 2010, spent 31 years on death row; Joseph Nichols has the 
2nd-longest period, spending 25 years on death row before his execution in 
2007.

There were more than 3,000 inmates on death row at the end of 2012, and the 
average inmate had spent about 14 years under a death sentence, according to 
Justice Department figures released last year. About 1 in 10 of these inmates 
on death row were sentenced before 1989.

A federal judge in California last year called that state's death penalty 
system unconstitutional and "completely dysfunctional." U.S. District Judge 
Cormac J. Carney wrote in a stern order that the state's system is so riddled 
with delays that death sentences are "actually carried out against only a 
trivial few of those sentenced to death."

In that case, Carney was writing about an inmate sentenced to death 2 decades 
earlier. Carney said that executing the inmate so long after his sentencing 
violated the Eighth Amendment???s ban against cruel and unusual punishment.

California and Texas, along with Florida, are the states with the most inmates 
on death row.

(source: Washington Post)

*************************************

Conservative Group: Executing Mentally Ill Killer Undermines Public Faith in 
Justice System



A group of self-described conservative policy experts and "thought leaders" say 
that executing a mentally ill Texas murderer would violate the constitutional 
ban on cruel and unusual punishment and undermine public trust in the justice 
system.

Calling themselves the "National Conservative Movement Leaders," the group -- 
which includes the former attorneys general of Virginia and New Mexico, the 
Reagan-era chief of the Office of Management and Budget, and an opinion editor 
with the right-leaning Washington Times -- filed a legal brief in support of 
death-row inmate Scott Panetti Wednesday. In its brief, the group urged the 
federal Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to grant Panetti's legal team's request 
for a new mental health evaluation in order to bolster their claim that Panetti 
is indeed too insane to be executed.

The brief is just the latest in the mind-bending debate over whether Panetti, a 
man with a history of treatment for mental illness who ruthlessly shotgunned 
his mother- and father-in-law to death in 1992, is competent enough for the 
ultimate punishment.

At trial, during which Panetti was somehow allowed to represent himself and 
simultaneously argue an insanity defense, Panetti donned a purple cowboy suit. 
He rambled throughout the court proceedings, at one point questioning a witness 
about "the difference between a rodeo hand and a buckaroo poet." He subpoenaed 
Jesus Christ.

Ultimately a jury didn't buy Panetti's insanity defense and sentenced him to 
death. In November of last year, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ruled that 
Panetti was fit to be executed. An outgoing Republican judge on the court 
disagreed so vehemently that he penned a dissent saying he now no longer 
believes in the death penalty.

"It is inconceivable to me how the execution of a severely mentally ill person 
such as [Panetti] would measurably advance the retribution and deterrence 
purposes purportedly served by the death penalty," wrote Judge Tom Price.

The case now stands before the Fifth Circuit, which halted Panetti's execution 
hours before he was set to be put to death in December.

Panetti's lawyers argue Panetti understands that, officially, he's been sent to 
death row for the murder of his in-laws, but that in reality Panetti's mind is 
so warped that he believes his punishment is just a pretext and cover for the 
truth: that prison officials are the pawn of Satan, who wants Panetti to die so 
he'll stop preaching the gospel.

Panetti's attorneys insist his that his mental state has only further 
deteriorated since his last mental health evaluation seven years ago. Among 
Panetti's more recent delusions, according to court filings: a belief that 
prison officials have implanted a listening device in Panetti's tooth to send 
commands and messages to his brain; that Panetti reads the Gospel to keep from 
being overwhelmed by the voices in his head; that CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer 
flashed Panetti's stolen prison ID card during a broadcast; that Panetti is 
indeed the father of actress and singer Selena Gomez.

In their brief, the "National Conservative Movement Leaders" insist that the 
objections from Panetti's legal team are not just frivolous, last-minute 
stalling tactics, despite claims to the contrary. In fact, the conservative 
supporters point out how a state district court on October 16, 2014 set 
Panetti's execution date for December 3 and never alerted the convict's 
lawyers. "Disturbingly, no one at the state trial court, the county district 
attorney's office, or the state Attorney General's office saw fit to inform 
Panetti's lawyers that the execution date had been set," they write (Panetti's 
lawyers only found out about the execution date 2 weeks after the court had 
scheduled it because of a newspaper article).

Urging the Fifth Circuit to grant Panetti's lawyers request for a new 
competency evaluation, the group writes, "this case presents the Court with 
overwhelming evidence of the justice system's failure to adhere to American 
constitutional principles of due process."

Some of the conservative group's members support the death penalty; others 
don't. "They are united, however, in their belief that the execution of Scott 
Panetti would serve no penological purpose and would in no way promote public 
safety," according to their brief. "Rather than serving as a proportionate 
response to murder, the execution of Panetti would only undermine the public's 
faith in a fair and moral justice system."

(source: Houston Press)








VIRGINIA:

Terry McAuliffe put in awkward spot on death penalty



State-sponsored executions in Virginia would become shrouded in unprecedented 
secrecy under legislation that is advancing with bipartisan support, including 
that of Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe.

The measure is intended to keep drugs used for lethal injections flowing into 
Virginia by shielding manufacturers from public scrutiny and political 
pressure.

Foreign companies have stopped selling such drugs as a result of pressure from 
their governments, leaving some states unable to carry out death sentences and 
prompting others to experiment with chemicals that have been blamed for several 
???high-profile botched executions.

The legislation would prevent the public from scrutinizing most everything to 
do with the death penalty in Virginia. The bill states that "all information 
relating to the execution process" would be exempt from the state's open 
???records law. Although the names and quantities of chemicals used would have 
to be disclosed, the names of the companies that sell them and information 
about buildings and equipment used in the process would be withheld.

Adding a political twist to the situation, the bill???s chief booster is 
McAuliffe, a Democrat who opposes the death penalty but whose support makes 
passage more likely.

The measure would place Virginia in the vanguard of states trying to continue a 
practice that most of their residents still support but that has become 
increasingly difficult to administer, for both political and technical reasons. 
The proposal has been praised by people who say it would ensure that executions 
are carried out in the most humane way possible. But it is denounced by death 
penalty opponents, as botched executions have increased scrutiny across the 
country, including a Supreme Court review of lethal injections in Oklahoma.

The secrecy provisions, in particular, are a matter of disagreement. Lisa 
Kinney, a spokeswoman for the Department of Corrections, said the law would 
provide "security" by shielding drug providers from "harassment, threats or 
danger." Foes contend that more scrutiny of state-sponsored executions, not 
less, is the way to prevent inhumane deaths.

"This bill is about them trying to hide challenges to them, not about their 
security," said defense attorney Jonathan Sheldon, who has been involved in 
litigation over lethal injection. "We don't need to know the name of who the 
[executioner] is. ... What we really want to know is: 'What is the procedure?' 
They're cloaking this in a false mask of security."

Sen. Thomas A. Garrett Jr. (R-Buckingham) said the opponents raised a 
"legitimate concern" about secrecy. But he added, "I would say that it's 
outweighed by us being able to carry out sentences that have been prescribed 
legally and throughout layer upon layer of due process."

McAuliffe's advisers have been surprised by the intensity of opposition, 
because they see the legislation as a way to avoid a return to the electric 
chair as the primary means of execution in a state where capital punishment 
remains the law.

McAuliffe spokesman Brian Coy said that although the governor does not support 
capital punishment, it is his responsibility to uphold the law. "He is a 
Catholic," Coy said, "so there is a moral component to his position on the 
issue, but he's governor, and he will enforce the law."

Several other states have enacted laws in recent years to shield the details of 
executions from public scrutiny. An Ohio law similar to Virginia's legislation 
was enacted late last year, but it is being challenged in federal court. Ohio 
has delayed all pending executions amid concerns about the drugs used.

In 2014, some lawmakers made an unsuccessful push in Virginia to reinstate the 
electric chair as the state's default method of execution should the necessary 
drugs become unavailable. McAuliffe did not take a position on that measure.

In neighboring Maryland, then-Gov. Martin O'Malley (D) made abolition of the 
death penalty a cornerstone of his legislative agenda. The 2 states are far 
apart on this issue. Maryland has executed 5 prisoners since the Supreme Court 
ended an effective moratorium on the death penalty in 1976; Virginia has 
executed 110.

Noting all the current legal challenges to execution methods and secrecy, the 
Virginia Catholic Conference's executive director, Jeff Caruso, said, "It seems 
like we should be slowing down instead of speeding up."

The politics of the death penalty began to change in Virginia in 2005, when 
Timothy M. Kaine (D), a death-penalty opponent who had defended death-row 
inmates pro bono, was elected governor. Kaine's Republican opponent, Jerry 
Kilgore, ran a TV ad saying that Kaine wouldn't have supported executing Adolf 
Hitler. Kaine, a Catholic, responded with an ad declaring that his faith led 
him to oppose the death penalty but that he would uphold the state law.

"Kaine demonstrated that if you articulate your position in a thoughtful and 
consistent manner, then people will respect that position," said J. Tucker 
Martin, Kilgore's spokesman in that race and later an aide to then-Gov. Robert 
F. McDonnell (R). Still, Martin said, he believes that Virginia remains "a 
pretty tough-on-crime state."

There were 11 executions on Kaine's watch, despite his beliefs.

A 2013 University of Mary Washington poll found that 65 % of Virginia adults 
believe that the state should "keep" the death penalty for 1st-degree murder.

"I continue to believe the majority of Virginians support the death penalty," 
said Secretary of Public Safety Brian Moran, who testified in favor of this 
year's lethal injection bill. "The death penalty exists in the commonwealth, 
and we're merely trying to ensure that those sentenced to death are able to 
have the choice of lethal injection."

When McAuliffe ran unsuccessfully for governor in 2009, according to news 
reports, he supported capital punishment. McAuliffe's office said this week 
that his position has always been that he would not let his personal feelings 
on the issue keep him from performing his duties as governor.

The death penalty still has majority backing nationally as well, according to a 
2014 Washington Post poll, although support is slowly falling. Among Democrats, 
however, a slim majority is opposed, and the same is true for non-white 
respondents. And if lethal injection is unavailable, overall support in the 
poll dips to 48 %.

Numbers of executions and death sentences have declined along with popular 
support in Virginia and nationally. There are currently eight inmates on death 
row in Virginia, fewer than in all but 7 other states that practice capital 
punishment. Virginia, once 2nd only to Texas in executions, has fallen behind 
Oklahoma and has executed fewer people than Florida every year since 2011.

Senate Minority Leader Richard L. Saslaw (D-Fairfax), who sponsored the bill on 
behalf of McAuliffe, suggested that death penalty opponents are hoping for a 
return to the electric chair to weaken support for capital punishment. Their 
argument, he said, was that "if you make the death penalty too humane .?.?. 
then people will think there's nothing wrong with the death penalty."

Del. Scott A. Surovell (D-Fairfax) said that he suspected that the Department 
of Corrections was seeking additional secrecy to prevent the kind of scrutiny 
that occurred last year.

Last year, soon after the department told lawmakers that it lacked a necessary 
lethal-injection drug, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported that an alternative 
had been purchased and stockpiled. Then, the department announced that the new 
drug had been approved for use. But the drug, midazolam, was involved in 
prolonged executions under scrutiny by the Supreme Court.

The Department of Corrections "got egg on their face," Surovell said. "They're 
trying to make all these documents secret so they don't get caught again."

Even without the legislation, obtaining records related to executions is far 
from easy. Surovell is engaged in a legal battle with the Department of 
Corrections over its refusal to reveal lethal-injection protocols, citing 
security concerns. The state Supreme Court will hear that case.

(source: Washington Post)








NORTH CAROLINA:

State seeking death penalty against Davis



The state will seek the death penalty against Eric Lorenzo Davis, charged with 
the 1st-degree murder of his daughter, Erica.

Davis had a court date Wednesday (Feb. 4) and it was continued until April 15.

Erica Davis, was found unresponsive by paramedics Oct. 11, 2013 in a hotel room 
in Qualla; the 4-year-old died a day later after being removed from life 
support.

At the Rule 24 hearing held Dec. 18, 2013, the state laid out aggravating 
factors which made the case eligible for the death penalty. They said the 
murder was especially heinous, atrocious or cruel; they also said it was part 
of a course of conduct in which the defendant engaged and which included the 
commission by the defendant of other crimes of violence against another person 
or persons.

Sometime before 7 a.m. on Friday, Oct. 11, 2013, a woman staying at the Qualla 
Motel heard banging on her door. When she opened the door, Eric Davis was 
standing outside. He told her that his daughter was choking on water and needed 
help, a juvenile petition filed by Jackson County Department of Social Services 
provided by the children's family stated.

The woman, a registered nurse, went to Davis' aid. When she saw Erica, however, 
the woman "immediately ... recognized that the child had head trauma" and 
notified Cherokee 911 dispatchers, the petition stated.

Cherokee, in turn, called Jackson County 911 (the motel is just outside the 
reservation boundary) and reported Erica was still breathing but wasn't 
responsive. EMS workers rushed to the scene. Seeing the child's injuries they 
called for deputies.

Eric Davis claimed he left Erica and his 3-year-old son, Eric Jr., on the 
previous night with someone named Pookie who lived on Wright's Creek in 
Cherokee.

When Erica arrived at Harris Regional Hospital, she was unconscious and her 
core temperature was 93.7, according to the petition. Erica had rib fractures, 
a depressed skull, subdural bleeding (blood on the brain's surface beneath the 
skull), old blood on the brain that indicated prior head injury, a collapsed 
lung, multiple circular bruising on her chest, significant lateral bruising on 
her buttocks and back, bruising on her throat and her eyes were bulging from a 
buildup of pressure, according to the petition.

The autopsy lists the official cause of Erica's death as "acute intracranial 
injury with subdural hematoma and cerebral edema" due to blunt trauma to the 
head. Erica was struck repeatedly, including with a cylindrical object; 
multiple contusions and several lacerations were found. There was blunt trauma 
to her thorax, abdomen, back and pelvis; 3 of her ribs were fractured, the 
autopsy report states.

Eric Davis is also charged with 2 counts of intentional child abuse inflicting 
serious bodily injury. His son was covered in bruises when investigators 
arrived. His buttocks showed heavy bruising and there were hand print marks on 
both sides of his face, the petition states.

Davis is represented by 2 attorneys since it is a capital case - Keith Hanson 
of Asheville and Kim Stevens of Winston-Salem.

District Attorney Ashley Welch and assistant DA Eric Bellas will be prosecuting 
for the state.

(source: The Sylva Herald)

****************

Death penalty sought in slaying of nurse in Cary



Wake County prosecutors announced Thursday that they plan to seek the death 
penalty against a man accused of shooting a nurse outside a Cary apartment 
complex in August.

Daniel Scott Remington, 36, of Gooseneck Drive in Cary, faces a charge of 
murder in the death of Wendy Jean Johnson, whom he allegedly shot around 11 
p.m. Aug. 22 in the parking lot of Hyde Park Apartments - less than 2 miles 
from his home.

Johnson, 58, of Sanford, had been in Cary for her job and, according to a 
search warrant in the case, was getting out of her car when Remington allegedly 
approached her and shot her after she wouldn't give him her purse.

She was taken to Duke University Hospital in Durham, where she was pronounced 
dead.

(source: WRAL news)








FLORIDA:

Jacksonville man's death-penalty trial in limbo until appellate court rules on 
conflict issue



Randall Deviney is living in a unique kind of legal limbo. He could go on trial 
for his life next week, or he could soon be getting a new lawyer and see his 
trial delayed for months.

Deviney, 25, is scheduled to go on trial Monday in Jacksonville charged with 
murdering 65-year-old neighbor Delores Futrell, and prosecutors are seeking the 
death penalty.

But the trial cannot actually begin until the 1st District Court of Appeal in 
Tallahassee rules on whether the office of Public Defender Matt Shirk has a 
conflict of interest in representing both Deviney and Donald James Smith, who 
is charged with the murder of 8-year-old Cherish Perrywinkle.

In a letter to the Times-Union, Deviney said he has information on another 
murder that Smith committed and is willing to share what he knows if 
prosecutors will promise to drop the death penalty and only put him in prison 
for about 20 years. The Public Defender's Office said this creates a conflict 
of interest that requires removal from representing both Deviney and Smith 
because it can't represent one without doing harm to the other.

But Circuit Judge Mallory Cooper refused to do so in either case because 
prosecutors said they have no interest in talking with Deviney about anything 
he knows about Smith. Assistant State Attorney Bernie de la Rionda has said he 
believes that Deviney is perpetuating a fraud on the court.

The Public Defender's Office appealed the decision and argued that an inherent 
conflict now exists even if prosecutors have no interest in talking with either 
man.

The appellate court is reviewing Cooper's ruling and ordered both cases halted 
while it considers the issue.

But Deviney is still scheduled to go on trial next week. At a pretrial hearing 
Thursday, Cooper rejected a request by Assistant Public Defender Melina Buncome 
that the case be indefinitely delayed.

The judge acknowledged that Deviney's trial couldn't begin Monday if they're 
still waiting for the appellate court to rule, but Cooper didn't delay the 
trial in the hope it would rule in the next few days.

Buncome argued it was causing too much stress for her witnesses to not know if 
they would be testifying next week or not.

De la Rionda, who opposed delaying the case, said he was ready to begin the 
trial. He said his witnesses were also in limbo, but the case should be tried 
next week if possible.

The case will only move forward if the appellate court affirms Cooper's ruling. 
If it orders the public defender removed from the case, it will take new 
lawyers months to get up to speed.

If there is no ruling by Monday, Cooper will have to decide whether to set a 
new trial date a few weeks ahead or indefinitely delay the trial and wait for a 
ruling.

Smith's case already has been indefinitely delayed.

Deviney is accused of slitting Futrell's throat in her Westside home on 
Bennington Drive. Futrell used to fix meals for Deviney, paid him to do odd 
jobs and spoke with him about troubles in his youth.

A jury previously convicted him in 2010 and recommended he be sentenced to 
death by a 10-2 vote. Cooper put him on death row, but the Florida Supreme 
Court threw out the conviction.

Justices ruled that police should have stopped questioning Deviney after he 
repeatedly told them he was done speaking.

Police ignored those comments and kept questioning him, and Deviney eventually 
confessed to killing Futrell.

(source: Jacksonville.com)








ALABAMA----former death row inmate dies

Convicted killer Borden dies in prison



The convicted killer of an elderly Lawrence County woman in 1993 has died in 
prison after a bout with pancreatic cancer.

James Henry Borden Jr., 65, died at William E. Donaldson Correctional Facility 
in Jefferson County last weekend, the Jefferson County Coroner's office 
confirmed Monday.

Borden died in the prison infirmary at 7:53 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 1. He had been in 
the infirmary since Dec. 22, and had a do-not-resuscitate order.

Borden was convicted and sentenced to death for the Sept. 5, 1993 murder of 
63-year-old Nellie Ledbetter, who was stabbed to death in front of her young 
grandchildren.

Borden was 1 of 3 men who drove to Ledbetter's house and approached her on the 
porch with her grandchildren.

Borden and the 2 other men left the residence when Ledbetter's husband came out 
on the porch.

Borden returned alone approximately 45 minutes later with a knife and held it 
to Ledbetter's throat trying to get her to leave with him. When she refused to 
leave, he fatally stabbed her in the chest and stomach in front of one of her 
grandchildren, who later testified at the trial.

Borden's trial took place in early December 1994, and it took jurors less than 
1 hour of deliberation to return a guilty verdict.

Borden was convicted of capital murder because of a previous murder conviction, 
the 1975 shooting death of a Landersville store owner.

The jury also voted 10-2 to recommend the death penalty, which Lawrence County 
Circuit Judge Philip Reich handed down.

However, Borden's death penalty was overturned by the Supreme Court with a 2002 
decision that said mentally retarded killers can't be executed. Experts 
determined Borden had an IQ of 53.

In 2005, the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals agreed that Borden should not 
face the death penalty.

(source: Moulton Advertiser)

***************************

Death penalty trial for Huntsville man charged with killing wife and young son 
could be delayed



A Huntsville man facing the possibility of the death penalty if he is convicted 
of killing his wife and young son has been given a new lawyer and it is not 
clear when the case will go to trial.

Stephen Marc Stone, 35, is charged with capital murder in the February 2013 
deaths of his wife, Krista Stone and their 7-year-old son, Zachary, at the 
family's home on Chicamauga Trail in south Huntsville.

Stone, who police said admitted strangling his wife and drowning his son, did 
not harm his 2 young daughters and turned himself in to police in Leeds - where 
his parents lived - the same day.

Madison County District Attorney Rob Broussard has said his office will seek 
the death penalty for Stone. Broussard is prosecuting Stone along with 
Assistant DA Tim Gann.

Stone has been represented by court-appointed attorneys Brian Clark and Lonzo 
Robinson.

But Robinson filed notice to the court Tuesday that he has taken a job with the 
City of Huntsville and has to withdraw from the case.

Robinson begins the new job Monday, said Huntsville City Attorney Peter 
Joffrion. Robinson will serve as the Supervising Prosecutor for the City 
Attorney's Office, Joffrion said.

Madison County Circuit Judge Donna Pate accepted the withdrawal and has 
appointed attorney Larry Marsili as Clark's co-counsel in representing Stone.

No trial date has been set. But the addition of new counsel in a death penalty 
case is likely to mean the date will be pushed back further to allow Marsili 
time to become familiar with the record.

Pate ordered a mental health evaluation for Stone last August. The judge asked 
state doctors to assess whether Stone is competent to stand trial and if he 
understood the nature of his actions at the time of the alleged offenses.

An insanity defense in Alabama requires the defense to prove the defendant was 
so afflicted by mental health issues he did not understand the nature or 
wrongfulness of his actions at the time of the offense.

Pate's order said the court found reasonable grounds exist to question the 
defendant's competency to stand trial and his mental state at the time of the 
offense.

During Stone's preliminary hearing in May 2013, a police investigator testified 
that Stone said something inside of him had "broken" the day before the 
killings.

The court record does not indicate the results of the state's mental health 
exam.

(source: al.com)








KENTUCKY:

It's just too expensive to execute people, says Kentucky lawmaker

Kentucky lawmakers have been trying for years to outlaw the death penalty, to 
no avail.

But proponents of the latest bill, a bipartisan effort, have seized upon an 
argument that has been growing in popularity nationwide.

It's just too expensive to execute people.

"We believe that strictly on the bases of costs, life without parole makes more 
sense," Rep. David Floyd (R) told the Louisville Courier-Journal. Floyd, the 
House Republican whip, introduced a bill on Wednesday to repeal Kentucky's 
death penalty.

At the very least, Floyd would like the state to figure out how much it's 
spending on death penalty trials. Thursday, he estimated that these cases have 
cost the state $400 million since 1976. In that time, Kentucky has only 
executed 3 people, the last one in 2008.

"We're talking about $130 million per execution to maintain a system that clogs 
the courts and delays finality for victims' families," he said.

There have always been moral arguments against the death penalty. Floyd said he 
opposes it because of his Christian faith. Furthermore, DNA evidence has 
produced a steady stream of death row exonerations in recent years, reminding 
the public that prosecutors and juries make mistakes.

"We have a system where the innocent are sacrificed so we can execute the 
b--d," Floyd said, noting that Kentucky has an alarmingly high error rate when 
it comes to capital convictions.

In 2011, the American Bar Association called for Kentucky to stop executing 
people until the state fixed its legal system. (Executions in Kentucky have 
effectively been on hold anyway since 2009, when the state's Supreme Court 
ruled that its lethal injection procedures needed to be reviewed.) The ABA 
report reviewed death penalty cases since 1976 and found that 64 % of 
defendants - 50 out of 78 - had seen their cases overturned on appeal.

Still, it's been hard for Floyd to convince some of his fellow lawmakers to 
stand with him against executions. A 2013 Courier-Journal poll of registered 
Kentucky voters found that two-thirds want capital punishment.

Last year, he hit on his current point. He had been talking to the state's 
public defender's office, which spends millions handling death penalty cases. 
Floyd began to see the outlines of an argument that might appeal to his 
budget-minded friends in the GOP.

This idea that there's something fiscally irresponsible about the death penalty 
is not new. But the talking point has become popular in recent years, as state 
governments continue to tread a shaky path out of the recession. In November, 
for instance, Kentucky faced a projected $135 million shortfall in its $9.8 
billion budget going into 2015.

Several states have produced studies showing that when a prosecutor decides to 
go for the death penalty, the cost of the case balloons.

In a report released in January, professors at Seattle University found that, 
on average, death penalty cases cost 1.5 times as much, or about $1 million 
more, than similar murder cases not involving the death penalty. In particular, 
the government spends about 3 times more on defense costs for these trials. 
(The research was funded by the American Civil Liberties Union.)

In California, a study from 2011 estimated that the state spends $184 million a 
year on costs related to death penalty, totaling over $4 billion since the 
state brought back capital punishment in 1978.

These kinds of cases are expensive in part because defense lawyers are required 
to pull out all the stops when a person's life is on the line.

"The ABA has put out guidelines that make it clear that people representing 
folks facing a death penalty have enormous responsibilities," said Jordan 
Steiker, a law professor at the University of Texas. This adds to the cost of a 
trial - not just the lawyers' fees, but fees for special experts, such as 
psychiatrists and litigation specialists. If a defendant can't afford these 
measures (and most don't), the bill goes to the state.

"Cost has really changed the practice on the ground," Steiker said. The number 
of death penalty cases has plummeted in recent decades, he said, in part 
because prosecutors are becoming cautious of how expensive the trials are.

Steiker, who clerked for Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, published an 
article in 2010 explaining how these economic concerns have changed the debate 
surrounding the death penalty. "The high cost of administering the death 
penalty has become a prominent - perhaps the most prominent - issue in 
contemporary discussions about whether the penalty should be limited or 
abolished," he wrote.

But will this argument gain ground in Kentucky? Floyd, the Republican 
representative, said he's already changed a few minds. His bill hasn't yet been 
penciled into the judiciary committee schedule, but he's hopeful this will be 
the year that everything changes.

(source: Washington Post)